Somewhere out there, the ship is waiting to take them home . . .

Here's what Masklin has to do: Find Grandson Richard Arnold (a human!). Get from England to Florida (possibly steal jet plane for this purpose, as that can't be harder than stealing the truck). Find a way to the "launch" of a "communications satellite" (whatever those are). Then get the Thing into the sky so that it can call the Ship to take the nomes back to where they came from.

It's an impossible plan. But he doesn't know that, so he tries to do it anyway. Because everyone back at the quarry is depending on him -- and because the future of nomekind may be at stake . . .